


Not Alone

by Beleriandings



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Drabble, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Found Family, Gen, HUGS!!!!!!!!, IPRE crew as family - Freeform, LISTEN i just wanted a Lucretia centric cuddlepile, aftermath of Lucretia's year alone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-28
Updated: 2018-01-28
Packaged: 2019-03-10 19:56:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13508667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beleriandings/pseuds/Beleriandings
Summary: “I made it. I made it! They tracked me down… and I got away on the ship, but they kept following. For a year I ran and I hid - and I had to fight, and I had to repair the ship in secret, I had to learn how to repair the ship. I was the only one. If I died too - I don’t even know how to fly the ship. I fucking made it!” (- TAZ episode 65)





	Not Alone

**Author's Note:**

> "I made it. I made it! They tracked me down… and I got away on the ship, but they kept following. For a year I ran and I hid - and I had to fight, and I had to repair the ship in secret, I had to learn how to repair the ship. I was the only one. If I died too - I don’t even know how to fly the ship. I fucking made it!”

Lucretia slumped down, her back against the bridge, her head in her hands. She was breathing too fast as the words came, tumbling one over the other clumsily, voice cracking at the end. After a moment she looked up at them, eyes wide, already filling with tears that she simply let fall freely down her face. 

For a moment, they all stared at her. Magnus - of course - was the first to act; immediately, he rushed over and got to his knees, throwing his arms around her. She melted into them gratefully, glad of the simple solidity and reality of him. Just holding him as tightly as she could, with a ferocity that would squeeze the breath out of anyone else.

But Magnus held her back just as hard, and though it made her a little dizzy it barely mattered; this already all felt a little like a dream. She had been alone for so long, so utterly alone, and now they were all here. It had seemed many times like she would be alone forever - that she would be killed and doom them all to death with her - but somehow, miraculously, here they all were.

Now Lup was letting out a yell of fierce joy, grabbing both Taako and Barry’s hands to pull them both into the hug, which was rapidly becoming a pile, and squeezing tight. Taako ruffled up her hair over her face, making her laugh with joyous disbelief that he was real. Barry’s shoulder was sort of awkwardly in her face now, but that didn’t matter; she realised that crying into the shoulder of a red IPRE robe while warm, soft arms held her was an experience that had gone from relatively commonplace to a forgotten dream of comfort and warmth in the last year. 

Next it was Merle who came over and laid a gentle hand on her arm, slightly awkwardly stroking her hair with his other hand and whispering nonsense that sounded like he too was on the verge of tears. She was grateful for the contact though; by now she was weeping a little harder at every touch, great heaving wracking sobs that shook her whole body, merely at their proximity. A moment later came Davenport, looking as though he had a thousand questions, but - bless him, she thought - her dear captain knew that now was not the time, and he clutched her hand very tight in his small warm one as Lup pulled him into the hug pile.

Last of all came Fisher, drifting through the air from the tank she had meticulously repaired. They laid a single tendril on the top of her head as she looked up, singing a soft song as she raised her tear-stained face, and gave a watery smile. 

They stayed like that for a long time, until the Void around the ship stopped being jiggly, and Davenport had to extricate himself from the pile to pilot them carefully down, onto blessedly green grass. Even from so far above, Lucretia couldn’t stop staring at it as the others held her; she hadn’t see green in a whole year, after all, and it almost hurt her eyes to look at lush plant colours, at anything other than dust greys and ashen black. 

They did not leave the Starblaster immediately; instead they all sat with Lucretia for a long, long time, until at last she rose to her feet. She picked up her journal which she had dropped to the floor and took a deep, trembling breath, then wiped her face, which was still swollen and smarting from her tears. 

Out there was a new world, but she wasn’t afraid anymore; she knew that whatever lay beyond the doors, with her friends at her side she would face it with strength and an open heart.

**Author's Note:**

> Maybe a tie-in with my Lucretia fic Metamorphic? Definitely thematically relevant to that. I just wanted Lucretia to get Many Hugs when that hell ordeal was over okay ;-;


End file.
